High Street as she passed up it on horseback with her brothers.  Narcissus had reined up to put some question or other about the drawings, but Endymion (who did not share his brother’s liking for M. Raoul) had ridden on, and she had ridden on too, though reluctantly.  She recalled his salute, his glance at her, and down-dropped eyes; she wondered what point Narcissus and he had discussed, and blamed herself for not having found courage to ask. . . .

The stable clock struck ten.  She arose and kissed her brothers good-night.  By Narcissus she paused.

“Be careful of your eyes, dear.  And if you are going to be busy with that great book these next few evenings I will have the table brought across to the other side where you will be cosier.”

Narcissus came out of his calculations and looked up at her gently.  “Please do not disarrange the furniture for me; a change always fidgets me, even before I take in precisely what has happened.”  He smiled.  “In that I resemble my old friend Vespasian, who would have no alterations made when he visited his home—­manente villa qualis fuerat olim, ne quid scilicet oculorum consuetudini deperiret.  A pleasant trait, I have always thought.”

He lit her candle and kissed her, and Dorothea went up the broad staircase to her own room.  Half-way along the corridor she stayed a moment to look down upon the hall.  Endymion had dropped his newspaper and was yawning; a sure sign that Narcissus, already reabsorbed in the Itinerary, would in a few moments be hurried from it to bed.

She reached the door of her room and opened it, then checked an exclamation of annoyance.  For some mysterious reason Polly had forgotten to light her candle.  This was her rule, never broken before.

She stepped to the bellpull.  Her hand was on it, when she heard the girl’s voice muttering in the next room—­the boudoir.  At least, it sounded like Polly’s voice, though its tone was strangely subdued and level.  “Talking to herself,” Dorothea decided, and smiled, in spite of her annoyance, as everyone smiles who catches another in this trick.  She dropped the bellpull and opened the boudoir door.

Polly was not talking to herself.  She was leaning far out of the open window, and at the sound of the door started back into the room with a gasp and a short cry.

“To whom were you talking?”

Dorothea had set the candle down in the bedroom.  Outside the window the park lay spread to the soft moonshine, but the moon did not look directly into the boudoir.  In the half-light mistress and maid sought each other’s eyes.

“To whom were you talking?” Dorothea demanded, sternly.

Polly was silent for a second or two, then her chin went up defiantly.

“To Mr. Raoul,” she muttered.

“To M. Raoul!—­to M. Raoul?  I don’t understand.  Is M. Raoul—­Oh, for goodness sake speak, girl!  What is that?  I see a piece of paper in your hand.”